A Glimpse into the Heart of Somatic Experiencing®

"We're in the business to support life force to find its natural process,

to support energy to move through the system" (Berns Galloway)

This statement captures the essence of Somatic Experiencing®: supporting the nervous system’s natural process of finding completion. When the nervous system receives a signal of threat, and we connect with the response that wants to happen, something important unfolds. If we can support the system to complete that response, a new neural pathway fires. Then we stand a chance of feeling safer, and the possibility for change occurs.

Let me take you on a brief journey into the essence of what happens in an SE™ process:

You and I connect. You start talking about something that happened, and you have a response over and over again. I'm interested in what's happening, not the content (your words or the story). I'm interested in the "state" (i.e. the nervous system’s underlying condition that shapes how the story is carried). I might see something happening in your body: an expression, a change in skin colour, muscle tone, or affect. And if I can, I'll draw your attention to it, and your attention grows. We track that. We follow that. If this connects to something you have experienced (usually a traumatic event), and a self-protective response emerges, I want to see whether you can become more aware of it: aware of the activation, the response to the threat. And if you can stay present with it, it can lead to something different. As I give you external support, as I witness it with you, you track it differently than before. Perhaps now a new piece can come to the fore, new in both of our awareness. And as we stay with that, something shifts. So with the intense activation, through somatic tracking, the system can "de-activate", signalling through the system, the body's physiology, and the whole system resets.

In this way, Somatic Experiencing® helps the body remember its own capacity to reset and to return to balance.